Smokers paradise

Des Moines (KWWL) - It has been six months since Iowa's smoking ban went into effect.

Some bar owners are scrambling to accomodate Iowans left looking for a place to smoke. One Iowa bar is spending quite a bit of cash to do it.

It's a rare sight in the cold Iowa months, a smoker blowing smoke rings without freezing, shivering, or shaking, and not wearing a coat.

"It's so nice to be outside somewhere you can have a cig and enjoy libations beer mixed drinks instead of going outside like a dog every 5 minutes." Douglas Cost said.

The new smoking patio at Cabaret in Des Moines is not illegal.

According to the Smoke Free Air Act it qualifies as a patio because of an open aired window.

To keep the temperature at a comfy 70 degrees 12 inches of a sand product along the floor is heated.

The pricy heated floors, fireplace, vaulted ceilings and furnace pump expensive heat so that customers can play pool and video games.

"One thing I am absolutly sure of is that we were able to maintain customers were smoking enjoying bar we kepy those didn't need to leave," Tim Kellog, manager said. "It's a delicate dance to follow all the strict smoke free air act rules."

A dance the American Cancer Society thinks is too complicated, and too tricky.

"I think the big problem with this too much focus centered on how to avoid the law or get around the law rather than health benefits of the law," Chuck Reed, American Cancer Society said.

Cabaret manager Tim Kellog says the patio is the difference between making a profit, and shutting it's doors. He says he's not trying to avoid the law, he's just trying to comply.

"Sometimes when it comes to bars people think we're out here trying to do something wrong it had possibility of taking us out of business and obiously a lot of people. I'm a non smoker but my business is about smoking," Kellog said.

Business Douglas Cost is happy to bring as long as he can light up.. As he plays his brother at a game of Golden Golf, he tries to explain why sipping cold beer and puffing a cigarette is so enjoyable.

"They go very well together like salt and pepper on the table," Cost says.